The Median Sib

The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

I spent awhile at the bookstore yesterday, and ended up buying Kate DiCamillo’s newest book, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.  I read the entire book this afternoon, and what a wonderful book it is!  The story is about Edward Tulane, a 3-ft high rabbit made almost entirely of china.  It’s a tale of Edward’s life and adventures as he grows a heart capable of embracing love and all the hurts and joys that come with it. 

The story reminds me of The Velveteen Rabbit who wanted to be “real.”  Initially Edward is content being self-involved and vain.  He learns to love, but he also learns that love isn’t always wonderful.  It involves pain and sadness, too. After many mishaps he decides not to open his heart again. The ending is predictable but still touching.

One could make a unit of study on quotes from the book.  Some examples:

Whom the whiskers had belonged to initially - what unsavory animal - was a question that Edward could not bear to consider for too long.  And so he did not.  He preferred, as a rule, not to think of unpleasant thoughts.

She leaned close to him.  She whispered, “You disappoint me.”

Edward felt something damp in his ears.  Abilene’s tears, he supposed.  He wished that she would not hold him so tight.  To be clutched so fiercely often resulted in wrinkled clothing.

Edward, for lack of anything better to do, began to think. He thought about the stars . . . . Never in my life, he thought, have I been farther away from the stars than I am now.

“Perhaps,” said the man, “you would like to be lost with us.  I have found it much more agreeable to be lost in the company of others.”

Edward knew what it was like to say over and over again the names of those you had left behind.  He knew what it was like to miss someone.  And so he lsitened. And in his listening, his heart opened wide and then wider still.

You are down there alone, the stars seemed to say to him.  And we are up here, in our constellations, together.

I have been loved, Edward told the stars.

So? said the stairs.  What difference does that make when you are all alone now?

Look at me, he said to her.  His arms and legs jerked.  Look at me.  You got your wish.  I have learned how to love.  And it’s a terrible thing.  I’m broken. My heart is broken.  Help me.

“Two options only,” he said.  “And your friend chose option two.  He gave you up so that you could be healed.  Extraordinary, really.”

“I have already been loved,” said Edward.  “I have been loved by a girl named Abilene.  I have been loved by a fisherman and his wife and a hobo and his dog.  I have been loved by a boy who played the harmonica and by a girl who died.  Don’t talk to me about love,” he said.  “I have known love.”

He prided himself on not hoping, on not allowing his heart to lift inside of him.  He prided himself on keeping his heart silent, immobile, closed tight.

I am done with hope, thought Edward Tulane.

The old doll said, “I wonder who will come for me this time.  Someone will come.  Someone always comes.  Who will it be?”

“You disappoint me greatly.  If you have no intention of loving or being loved, then the whole journey is pointless.”

I got carried away with quotes.  There are so many good ones.  If you want a book that will make you think, that will show both the good and bad of life, then this would be an excellent choice for you.

Yesterday I wrote about reading a book entitled Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy.  Last  night, after RT was asleep, Jake was still making noises and I couldn’t sleep.  So I dragged a warm blanket to the recliner in the guest bedroom, settled back and finished reading the book.  It took a couple of hours, and I wasn’t in bed until after 1:20 a.m.  However, the book was worth it.  First, let me provide a warning to parents and teachers:  There are a few damns and hells in the book.  And the storyline is one for older children.  The story takes place along the Maine coastline in the early 1900’s.  It’s about racism, meanness and greed in the guise of Christianity.  Good triumphs over evil . . . sometimes, but not always.  And because good doesn’t always triumph, there is destruction and death.  Several deaths.  What startled me when I read the information at the end of the book is that the book is based on a true story. 

I won’t tell you anymore about the storyline.  However, if you have a upper elementary or junior high student who can handle a little profanity and a disturbing storyline, it is an excellent book.  I understand why it is a Newbery Honor book.  The story will stay with me for a long time.

Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy  

I read a lot of children’s literature - everything from picture books to middle school and high school fiction.  As long as I’m a children’s reading specialist, it is part of my job.  It is also something I enjoy immensely.  Oftentimes children’s literature is better than adult literature.

This afternoon I’m reading a novel by Gary D. Schmidt entitled Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy.  It was a Newbery Honor Book in 2005.  It’s for upper elementary/junior high kids.  I’m just a couple chapters into the book, but I came across a conversation that fascinated me. 

In the story, Turner is a preacher’s son in the early 1900’s who has just moved to a new town.  Shortly after moving, he was skipping rocks one day, and one bounced off an elderly woman’s fence, and now he must read to her each day as penance.  This is part of their conversation during his first visit to read to her.

Suddenly, her eyes opened and she lifted her head.  “Have you thought about what your last words might be?  You’re never too young to know what your last words might be.  Death could come along at any moment and thrust his dart right through you.”  She jerked her arm out at him, and Turner shot back against the organ.

“I supposed,” he whispered, “something like, ‘The Lord is my shepherd.’”

“Too expected,” she said, shaking her head.  “nobody would care to remember that, and you’d have wasted your one opportunity.  You don’t get two chances to say your last words, you know.”

Sometimes it doesn’t take much to get me wondering, but these few lines did it for me.  I can think (tongue in cheek) of a couple for myself:

Wow!  That was amazing!  Hope we didn’t disturb the neighbors.

Who would have guessed I’d live to be over 100!

Nah - those are lame.  It would be nice to impart words of wisdom for the ones left behind, but I don’t know what those words could be.

So, I ask you:  What would YOU like your last words to be?

Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy

(2) 
Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems

 I just finished re-reading Touching Spirit Bear, a children’s novel (older elementary and middle school, grades 4-8) by Ben Mikaelsen.  The main character, Cole, has been physically and emotionally abused by his father since he was very little, and he lashes out at others as a result.  The author, Mikaelsen, takes up this serious issue and writes about it sensitively and without resorting to profanity or vulgarity.  As a parent and a teacher, I appreciate that.  

After years of being in trouble with the law and after severely beating a younger child, Cole must face either prison or “Circle Justice”, a Native American way of dealing with anger and violence.  Cole doesn’t submit to Circle Justice easily, and his anger, rebellion and his eventual forgiveness of others and himself are skillfully portrayed in the story.